Smith, Charlotte

, an elegant poetess, was born in
1749. She was the daughter of Nicholas Turner, esq. a
gentleman of Sussex, whose seat was at Stoke, near GuiU
ibrd; but he had another house at Bignor Park, on the
banks of the Aru.n, where she passed many of her earliest
years, amidst scenery which had nursed the fancies of Otway and Collins, and where every charm of nature seems
to have left the most lively and distinct impression on her
mind. She discovered from a very early age an insatiable
thirst for reading, which was checked by an aunt, who had
the care of her education; for she had lost her mother almost in her infancy. From her twelfth to her fifteenth
year, her father resided occasionally in London, and she
was introduced into various society. It is said that before
she was sixteen, bhe married Mr. Smith, a partner in his
father’s house, who was a West India merchant, and also
an East India director; an ill-assorted match, and the prime
source of all her future misfortunes. After she had resided
some time in London, and partly in the vicinity, Mr. Smith’s
father, who could never persuade his son to give his time
or care sufficiently to the business in which he was engaged,
allowed him to retire into the country, and purchased for
him Lyss farm in Hampshire.

In this situation, Mrs. Smith, who had now eight children,
passed several anxious and important years. Her husband
was imprudent, kept a larger establishment than suited his
fortune, and engaged in injudicious and wild speculations
in agriculture. She foresaw the storm that was gathering
over her; but she had no power to prevent it; and she endeavoured to console her uneasiness by recurring to the
muse, whose first visitings had added force to the pleasures
of her childhood. “When in the beech woods of Hampshire,” she says, “I first struck the chords of the melancholy lyre: its notes were never intended for the public ear:
it was unaffected sorrow drew them forth I wrote mournfully, because I was unhappy.”

In 1776, Mr. Smith’s father died; in four or five years
afterwards Mr. Smith served the office of high sheriff for
Hampshire, a-xl immediately afterwards, his affairs were
brought to a crisis, and hevxas confined in the King’s-bench.
| prison. There Mrs. Smith accompanied him, and passed
with him the greater part of his confinement, which lasted
seven months, and it was by her exertions principally, that
he was liberated. At this unhappy period, she had recourse
to those talents, which had hitherto been cultivated only
for her own private gratification. She collected together
a few of those poems, which had hitherto been confined
to the sight of one or two friends, and had them printed at
Chichester in 1784, 4to, with the title “Elegiac Sonnets
and other Essays.” A second edition was eagerly called
for in the same year.

The little happiness she enjoyed from Mr. Smith’s liberation was soon clouded, and he was obliged to fly to France
to avoid the importunity of his creditors. Thither likewise
Mrs. Smith accompanied him; and after immediately returning with the vain hope of settling his affairs, again
passed over to the continent, where having hired a dreary
chateau in Normandy, they spent an anxious, forlorn, and
expensive winter, which it required all her fortitude, surrounded by so many children and so many cares, to survive.
The next year she was called on again to try her efforts in
England. In this she so far succeeded as to enable her
husband to return; soon after which they hired the old
mansion of the Mill family at Wolbeding in Sussex.

It now became necessary to exert her faculties again as
a means of support; and she translated a little novel of abbe
Prevost; and made a selection of extraordinary stories from
“Les Causes Celebres” of the French, which she entitled
“The Romance of Real Life.” Soon after this she was
once more left to herself by a second flight of her husband
abroad; and she removed with her children to a small cottage in another part of Sussex, whence she published a new
edition of her “Sonnets,” with many additions, which afforded her a temporary relief. In this retirement, stimulated by necessity, she ventured to try her powers of original composition in a novel called “Emmeline, or the Orphan of the Castle,” 1788. This, says her biographer,
*' displayed such a simple energy of language, such an
accurate and lively delineation of character, such a purity
of sentiment, and such exquisite scenery of a picturesque
and rich, yet most unaffected imagination, as gave it a hold
upon all readers of true taste, of a new and captivating
kind “The success of this novel encouraged her to produce others for some successive years,” with equal felicity,
| with an imagination still unexhausted, and a command of
language, and a variety of character, which have not yet
received their due commendation.“” Ethelinde“appeared
in 178!;” Celestina“in 1791;” Desmond“in 1792;
and” r \ ht- Old Manor House“in 1793. To these succeeded” The Wanderings of Warwick“the” Banished Man;“”Momalbert;“”Marchmont;“” The young Philosopher,“and the” Solitary Wanderer," making in all 38 volumes.
They weie not, however, all equally successful. She was
led by indignant feelings to intersperse much of her private
history and her law-suits; and this again involved her sometimes in a train of political sentiment, which was by no
means popular, and had it been just, was out of place in a
moral fiction.

Besides these, Mrs. Smith wrote several beautiful little
volumes for young persons, entitled “Rural Walks;”
“Rambles Farther;” “Minor Morals,” and “Conversations;” and a poem in blank verse, called “The Emigrant,”
in addition to a second volume of“Sonnets.”

During this long period of constant literary exertion,
which alone seemed sufficient to have occupied all her time,
Mrs. Smith had both family griefs and family business of
the most perplexing and overwhelming nature to contend
with. Her eldest son had been many years absent as a
writer in Bengal; her second surviving son died of a rapid
and violent fever; her third son lost his leg at Dunkirk, as
an ensign in the 24th regiment, and her eldest daughter
expired within two years after her marriage. The grandfather of her children had left his property, which lay in
the West Indies, in the hands of trustees and agents, and
it was long unproductive to her family. Some arrangements
are said to have been attempted before her death which
promised success, but it does not appear that these were
completed. Her husband, who seems never to have conquered his habits of imprudence, died, it is said, in legal
confinement, in March 1806; and on Oct. 28 following,
Mrs. Smith died at Telford, nearFarnham, in Surrey, after
a lingering and painful illness, which she bore with the utmost patience.

The year following her death an additional volume of her
poetry was published under the title of “Beachy Head and
other Poems,” which certainly did not diminish her wellearned and acknowledged reputation as a genuine child of
genius. Her novels ma,y be forgotten, and, we believe,
| are in a great measure so at present; but we agree with her
kind eulogist, that of her poetry it is not easy to speak in
terms too high. “There is so much unaffected elegance:
so much pathos and harmony in it: the images are so soothing, and so delightful; and the sentiments so touching, so
consonant to the best movements of the heart, that no
readt-r of pure tasir can grow weary of perusing them.”
It was reported that her family intended to publish memoirs
of her life, and a collection of her letters; but as at the
distance of almost ten years nothing of this kind has appeared, we presume that the design, for whatever reason,
has been abandoned. 1

1 From an elegant tribute to her memory in the Cenf. Lit. vol. IV. —Gent.
Mag. vol. LXXVI.

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